Leveraging digital product creation for commercial fashion photography

FLAIR PTTRNS
Written By Zhana Vasileva

Appealing products and collections are essential for fashion brands, but presenting them in a visually attractive way and with variety is crucial for e-commerce and retail. As Luke Davie, creative manager at Need Supply, pointed out, “Product imagery is not considered to be the most creative aspect of the brand, but it’s what people engage with the most.” Customers need to understand why a product is the right choice for them, and they can only make that decision based on how brands visually portray the look and feel of their collections. It’s not a secret that fashion collections will only get sold if they are attractive in the eyes of the consumer and displayed in sufficient detail and with enough variations (Salsefy, 2019). The visual presentation of products and commercial product photography are thus much more important than product descriptions, calls to action, or product promotions.

Traditional product photoshoots, however, can be quite a time-consuming process. With digitalization and the application of innovative technologies in the supply chain, fashion and retail companies have been saving on costs and working more efficiently. And now, we have the opportunity to leverage digital product creation to generate high-quality marketing visuals.

The time- and cost-consuming reality of commercial fashion photography

Most fashion brands commonly invest a great number of resources in making product photos. The high costs are in accordance with the often lengthy and tedious photoshoot and post-production processes, especially when we talk about shooting mass collections. Let’s break down the cycle into steps.

  • It all starts with product shipping, a costly and complex logistical operation that can take up to a few weeks to deliver the items to the studio or photoshoot location.

  • Finding models that fit each collection’s specific look and feel and booking the right photographer is what comes next. On top of that, working with a proper lighting setup, equipment, and a team of professionals to bring the whole process to life—undoubtedly, the list expands with the acceleration of the size and level of the desired output.

  • After everything has been set up, the actual production process starts, which can be very monotonous and time-consuming, from unpacking each garment to fitting it on a real model or a mannequin and adjusting it to sit perfectly. And that process usually repeats itself over and over until several perfected shots have been made of each item, from different angles and often in different outputs.

  • The post-production process is, more often than not, even more laborious, with editing and selection of each shot to meet the same high-quality result everywhere.

Summary

Commercial fashion photography can be a highly complex and costly process. Fashion brands and retailers have thus started to leverage digital product creation technologies to increase their time-to-market, save on costs, and limit physical sampling. Companies are now using their 3D design files to generate photorealistic marketing and sales visuals with 3D rendering software, slowly replacing their product photography efforts.

Fashion rendering can fully mimic a commercial fashion photoshoot by aligning the camera, lighting, and background settings with a brand’s identity while delivering high-quality fashion renders often indistinguishable from product photography. Fully automated rendering solutions promise to provide hyper-realistic visuals at high speed and scale, allowing designers to focus their time on designing.

Key takeaways

  • Brands are generating marketing and e-commerce visuals from their design files with 3D rendering software, saving up, on average, six times on product photography costs and more than eight times on speed and efficiency.

  • E-commerce-ready product visuals with photorealistic quality can be generated the minute the designs are completed as 3D files, allowing brands to sell their collections before manufacturing (thus manufacturing based on demand).

  • Fashion renders can be aligned to a brand’s identity and guidelines to replicate a complete commercial fashion photoshoot setup and outcome, delivering flexibility and efficiency while opening space for creative editorial freedom.

 
 

Fashion brands are choosing 3D workflows over traditional sampling processes

As part of the ongoing digital transformation in the fashion industry, many fashion brands have started to utilise 3D design software for digital product creation, reducing costs, improving collaboration, and speeding up their time-to-market. Virtual sampling has been the most popular use of 3D visualisation in the fashion industry over the past few years, specifically for luxury brands (Bain, 2022), contributing to a higher efficiency level in designing, manufacturing, and cross-departmental collaboration.

Digital product creation (DPC or 3DPC), however, can be strategically implemented into each existing part of the business cycle, from product creation to buying and selling. Mark Harrop, founder and CEO of The Interline, shares that to bring digital product creation to a larger scale, fashion businesses must increase the use of digital assets in upstream cases, for development and manufacturing, but also downstream, towards e-commerce and in consumer-facing scenarios (Mancenido, 2022).

“Companies have been saving on costs and working more efficiently. And now, we have the opportunity to leverage digital product creation to generate high-quality marketing visuals.”
 
 
 

Fashion rendering for commercial product photography

Companies are progressively expanding their digital way of working by leveraging fashion renders from their 3D design files to generate photorealistic marketing and e-commerce visuals. A common misconception is that high-level technology must be more expensive than traditional product photoshoots. In fact, rendering saves companies, on average, six times the costs usually spent on product photography (Modelry, 2023). In addition, brands need far less time to generate real-looking product shots, starting at, on average, eight times faster than traditional product photography. Even further, the product visuals can be generated much earlier in the process, right after the designs are finished. The high-quality fashion renders of digital product creation files are already getting significantly close to the quality of traditional product photography, if not better, making the difference between an actual product photo and a digitally rendered image often unnoticeable.

The fashion brand VILA, part of BESTSELLER, recently shared in a case study how they leverage digital product creation and high-quality rendering to replace product photography. According to Charlotte Strobrawe, Head of 3D at VILA, “Our customers greatly appreciate the seamless quality we achieve in our images from 3D-developed styles. The line between our 3D renders and physical pack shots of garments is nearly invisible, showcasing our commitment to excellence and attention to detail”.

“Product visuals can be generated much earlier in the process, right after the designs are finished”
 
 
 

How to create digital marketing visuals with 3D and rendering software

To generate high-quality fashion renders of products, fashion brands must already have their 3D garment files ready. Brands can either use their 3D design files with sewing patterns prepared for manufacturing or create 3D files specifically to render photorealistic visuals. The next step is deciding on rendering software that best fits their output and quality needs.

Most 3D design software packages, such as CLO and Browzwear, offer a rendering solution that retailers can use to generate renders on their own. In addition, fashion brands can turn their 3D design files (CLO3D or Browzwear output files) into beautifully rendered visuals with 3D animation software such as Blender, Keyshot, and 3DS Max.

These solutions imply, however, a very manual way of working. The rendering process can also be fully automated, powered by cloud computing power, which requires far less time to achieve results and lets designers focus their time on designing. The fashion rendering solution, FLAIR PTTRNS, automates the rendering process, making it an efficient option for generating photorealistic product visuals and videos at high speed and scale.

For further reading, have a look at The Interline DPC report, which explores key players in digital product creation (from material digitisation and 3D simulation to new experiences in selling online and offline).

 

What more can high-quality fashion renders offer fashion brands and retail?

Replicating an exact product photoshoot outcome or forging imaginary worlds with 3D environments

Digital rendering can save time and product photography expenses, but it also comes with a lot of flexibility in output creation. Whether fashion brands want their garments displayed on an ‘invisible’ mannequin (pack shots) or a real-looking digital avatar, such as flat lays or 360° video clips, digital rendering makes all variations and possibilities accessible without wasting time. With just a click or two, the output of the renders can be fully alternated to match the desired visuals, directly ready to use for product presentation.

Further, the rendered visuals can fully mimic a brand’s commercial fashion photography setup, from the camera settings to the desired lighting, shadows, and poses. The output of the visuals can also be designed to match the brand identity and guidelines of the specific brand, making it a realistic representation of a product photoshoot while also delivering high-quality fashion renders that do not require post-production.

“In the digital world, there are quite a few more possibilities that are not feasible in the physical world. This gives space for imagination and creative freedom.”
— Jelle Stienstra from PTTRNS.ai

Digital renders can surely match the quality and possibilities of a commercial fashion photoshoot, but they also offer a vast space for freedom and creativity. 3D rendering can truly mimic the real-life world, from a plain photo studio backdrop to showcasing renders in any location and environment. But the possibilities don’t just stop there; 3D workspaces provide freedom, fostering creativity and inspiring imaginary worlds; a digital fashion show in the clouds or a rendered bralette floating above a botanical garden are all within reach. Digital and 3D technologies offer flexibility and efficiency and create space for the creative mind to generate breathtaking designs, visuals, and environments, making the imaginable come to life.

Ana Cristina Codreanu. "Leo in the Garden." 2022.

 

Sell collections before manufacturing with high-quality fashion renders

The ever-competitive and fast-paced fashion and retail environment continuously forces brands to speed up their time-to-market. The common supply-chain disruptions and logistical issues can make the process of manufacturing, shipping, and selling highly complicated for many retailers. Traditional product photography requires each clothing item to be fully manufactured and shipped before the marketing visuals can be created. This is, however, not the case for digital rendering.

E-commerce-ready product visuals can be generated the minute the designs are completed as 3D files, significantly increasing the speed-to-market.

The remarkable thing is that the digitally rendered photos and videos can get as close to the actual product photo quality as possible, making it hardly possible for an untrained eye to notice the difference. Looking at the bigger picture, retailers leveraging digital product creation for commercial fashion photography will also reduce the amount of garment shipping, contributing to a more sustainable fashion industry.

Digital product creation is the future of e-commerce and retail

3D designing and manufacturing have already been speeding up the time-to-market and saving resources for many fashion brands and retailers. Digital renders are now progressively taking up space in product presentation, helping brands ease out the process of product photography and the creation of high-quality fashion renders for marketing. The future is here; photorealistic fashion rendering is already delivering remarkable visual results for companies, and the technology will undoubtedly continue to improve with time, bringing life to what was before only imaginable.

 
 

References

Zhana Vasileva
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